So exactly the same thing western dissidents can expect in their home countries in couple of years?
How to best prepare for the coming collapse and possible freezing of assets
- Thread starter COtrailrider
- Start date
I've been thinking about buying a fireproof/waterproof safe to store my Trezor, silver, cash, legal docs, etc, for that reason. I don't trust my apartment neighbors, and the last thing I need is one of them to drop a blunt and set the building on fire.
Good points about animals and seeds - I forgot those. Reminds that everyday necessities such as tobacco/cigarettes, tampons, powdered milk, coffee, alcohol, basically all prepper supplies are good investments too. These can be bartered with (e.g. cigarettes in prison) and are always in-demand.
Another asset I've heard for higher NW individuals are luxury items such as Rolexes, art, and niche collectibles. This made me curious about it as an investment class again so I found this interesting article that details how the past five years Rolex watches have outperformed many other asset classes including gold and index funds. Doesn't take up much space, is functional, holds value, so seems like a worthy pursuit.
- Buy a stash of gold bars and bury it in a hidden location in nature known only to you. I've done this and am wondering how effective it would be and if any one else has tried this. It's only a fraction of my assets but still in the six figures worth of gold.
- I got my parents to buy into bitcoin a while back, to the tune of nearly hundreds of thousands, but then they got a little upset when it went down in value the past year. Of course, my bitcoin was purchased below the $20k mark so I didn't lose much, but I'm apprehensive about the fluctuating value.
One more thing I should add is start getting your name out for your service/trade before the decline really takes off. Marketing and word of mouth is easy now. People are tripping over themselves to hire tradespeople. It will be much harder to get known as a guy with a bulldozer if there is limited/no internet or limited/no cell phone. However, if you have 25 - 100 people who have already used your service you are leaps and bounds ahead of someone who attempts to start after the collapse.
It depends. If you are a US citizen, not really, and if you do, they will almost definitely send your details to the IRS. For non-US, increasingly fewer countries with higher requirements and more stringent controls.
These are the countries were you might be able to open an account and not be reported (for now).
Common Reporting Standard - Wikipedia
You might have better luck with EMIs like Wise.com, Curencyx and Payoneer.
But it's not really that valuable. I have accounts in three countries. If one pops, I have two more countries (for the time being). I am also a zero-tax resident. That is much more important.
By the way, some lessons from what just happened to Russia, the first week:
- dollar cash is the king (physical bills, not what's in the bank)
- physical gold is the 2nd after dollar (paper gold is trash), silver doesn't get much interest
- cash rouble and dollar deposits in the banks such as savings and CDs offer very high rates, as bank rate went to over 20% overnight, but there's a question if people are going to get those deposits back. There's a chance of confiscation by the government or temporary freeze and de-valuation. Also, banks delay or refuse paying out deposits in cash (USD, Euro investments)
- crypto is generally not advised as to where to put the money in. Because it's expected one might not be able to get the money back out.
Possible bank freeze on crypto cashing-out is expected. You can't buy food or other stuff with crypto, physical not the online stuff.
So far no sign of crypto friendliness from the government.
- foreign stocks might be confiscated and are too risky to own
- local Russian stocks are risky as they collapsed and the upside isn't seen, and trading was frozen for days now, today was the first day they opened the trading.
People weren't able to liquidate their positions, as their investment had burned.
Government had promised to help investors by buying the stocks out from them, but people are expecting to be paid dime on a dollar.
- dangerous to do physical transactions P2P especially large sums, and not with a bank, as easy to get robbed or scammed, happens a lot, scams exploded, also fake cash money
- not allowed to move personal money out of the country only 10K USD max and only if you carry them in cash. Can move gold out of the country
- from real estate, city flats are considered the best investment, the closer to the big city the better
- dollar cash is the king (physical bills, not what's in the bank)
- physical gold is the 2nd after dollar (paper gold is trash), silver doesn't get much interest
- cash rouble and dollar deposits in the banks such as savings and CDs offer very high rates, as bank rate went to over 20% overnight, but there's a question if people are going to get those deposits back. There's a chance of confiscation by the government or temporary freeze and de-valuation. Also, banks delay or refuse paying out deposits in cash (USD, Euro investments)
- crypto is generally not advised as to where to put the money in. Because it's expected one might not be able to get the money back out.
Possible bank freeze on crypto cashing-out is expected. You can't buy food or other stuff with crypto, physical not the online stuff.
So far no sign of crypto friendliness from the government.
- foreign stocks might be confiscated and are too risky to own
- local Russian stocks are risky as they collapsed and the upside isn't seen, and trading was frozen for days now, today was the first day they opened the trading.
People weren't able to liquidate their positions, as their investment had burned.
Government had promised to help investors by buying the stocks out from them, but people are expecting to be paid dime on a dollar.
- dangerous to do physical transactions P2P especially large sums, and not with a bank, as easy to get robbed or scammed, happens a lot, scams exploded, also fake cash money
- not allowed to move personal money out of the country only 10K USD max and only if you carry them in cash. Can move gold out of the country
- from real estate, city flats are considered the best investment, the closer to the big city the better
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When we are talking about cash I understand it's nice to have on hand while assets are frozen, but at some point won't they "unfreeze" the assets? I don't get how they can just keep your money locked down indefinitely in a bank. Banks are insured by FDIC so you shouldn't lose it. Can someone help me understand this? My living situation makes me reluctant to just withdraw thousands in cash. I don't like to have it floating around, I don't have a safe or safety deposit box, and definitely don't want to be traveling around with it. I could store it at parents house but they live across the country so if things collapsed I think it would be hard to get a hold of it anyways.
Also, aren't they trying to shift to a cashless society? What makes people think that after the collapse cash will even be useful?
Also, aren't they trying to shift to a cashless society? What makes people think that after the collapse cash will even be useful?
This is unrealistic. The US has held Iranian seized assets for over 40 years off and on. Obama returned some of the funds as part of the JPCOA in 2015, but some were still held back. If Biden cuts a deal with them, he might return them. On the other hand, that situation is up in the air, since Russia was involved in those negotiations. So, this is one guide on how long it might take.
Assume any seized funds will be handled as fairly as the way BLM riots were handled vs the way the January 6 Capital Hill riots were handled.
If your living situation doesn't allow you to keep cash securely, then maybe keep your money in the bank, but use it to pay off debts as much as possible, and work on getting yourself a living arrangement where you can store valuables safely.
Don't quote me, but I think they can just take your money if they saw you are unlawful.
If they freeze everyone's assets why would debts matter? I assume they'll just cancel the student loans I have if this freeze over were to take place...
It's not certain they will seize funds, although it's a serious possibility. It's also possible they will seize other people's funds, but you will not attract their attention.
The best plan is to proceed with your financial plans as if things will continue normally, but also have a plan B for various potential problems like a real pandemic, hurricane, big earthquake, race wars, totalitarian government, etc.
I think the odds of some kind of collapse or calamity in the US in coming years is at least 30%, and possibly over 70%. I hope not, but I am trying to make plans that will make me more resilient if these things happen.
Most people are just the opposite. 100% vulnerable and unprepared.
Ok, guys, as I see, some of you modern people need a little help.
The only way how to keep anything safely, without fear of loss, seizure, theft, war, alien invasion, or anything else, is this: (proven by centuries)
The only way how to keep anything safely, without fear of loss, seizure, theft, war, alien invasion, or anything else, is this: (proven by centuries)
- Keep your mouth shut. Always
- Solid PVC sewer pipe with caps
- Quality shovel
- Place and time with zero people around
- Good memory
And to add to my above post - I was wrong, Russia still did not open trading in it's stock exchange (despite Central Bank promising to open trading every day) - trading had been shut down for a week now.
Foreigners holding Russian stocks - one can hold ADR/GDR depositary receipts for foreign stock - can not and likely will not be able to ever liquidate them and those will be just written off (they can't convert them to real, albeit devalued, stocks so far, looks like, I'm positive on this for individual investors)
Just shows how much all that paper and electronic records are worth. It's all good till SHTF.
Government might do hard crackdown on crypto as it's believed NATO may try to fund the opposition/rebellion using crypto payments, paying people to get out into the streets.
Foreigners holding Russian stocks - one can hold ADR/GDR depositary receipts for foreign stock - can not and likely will not be able to ever liquidate them and those will be just written off (they can't convert them to real, albeit devalued, stocks so far, looks like, I'm positive on this for individual investors)
Just shows how much all that paper and electronic records are worth. It's all good till SHTF.
Government might do hard crackdown on crypto as it's believed NATO may try to fund the opposition/rebellion using crypto payments, paying people to get out into the streets.
I'm going to chime in that real Cash is King and if SHTF then the real stuff will be all that people fully understand. It's been ingrained in them since birth. People don't get gold and silver. I'd use those as an inflation hedge.
Also, to clarify about NATO possibly using crypto to fund rebellion/protests in Russia (which can lead to crackdown) - people won't accept crypto for this but the concern is that the organizers taking it and cashing it out through the bank - and people will take cash. So, what I meant was cutting off crypto/banks link and making it impossible to cash out, that's what is feared by investors.
There are P2P, decentralized exchanges available now and as far as I can tell they'll be available after crackdowns too. LocalMonero and Bisq are two I'm familiar with. They offer face to face exchanges, exchange via mail, exchanges for gift cards, etc. Banks aren't the only offramp for crypto that someone has.
There's also a very long-term utility inherent in precious metals if the dollar (or another national currency) NEVER came back. Confederate dollars weren't useful after April 1865 even if they hadn't been worth much beforehand. Bullion was.